'Cheddar and Biscuit': Red Lobster rescues second SUPER RARE 'orange lobster' in two months
In July 2022, Red Lobster employees hit the headlines after they rescued a massively rare orange lobster from their daily fresh seafood shipment. Instead of becoming someone's dinner, the lobster was named "Cheddar" and given the protection it deserved. The incident occurred in Florida where Red Lobster employees happened to spot the unusually brightly colored specimen in their live lobster shipment from that day.
The Orange lobster is a super rare species known for, no surprise, their bright orange color. Statistically, only one in 30 million lobsters is prone to turning into an orange lobster. Red Lobster staff revealed that they named their new bud "Cheddar" as a tribute to Cheddar Bay Biscuits, a line that is also owned by the chain. Cheddar has now been passed onto Ripley's Aquarium of Myrtle Beach with a team that is taking good care of young Ched and also studying his species.
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To Red Lobster's very own surprise, employees at their Meridian outlet in Mississippi, found yet another organge specimen from the rare species and rescued him too. Employees decided to name him "Biscuit" to match "Cheddar," the name of his 'brother' of the same hue. Biscuit is also headed to Ripley's Aquarium in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. The fact that orange lobsters are a literal one-in-30-million find has left people shocked that two of them have been rescued in such short intervals. Ripley's has taken a special interest to looking into this phenomenon and is studying the orange lobsters to see what possibly caused them to pop up this way. “With the statistic ‘one-in-30 million’ starting to raise eyebrows, Ripley’s Aquariums is setting out to study these animals and better understand this anomaly,” an Instagram post by Ripley’s Aquarium read.
Jared Durrett, director of husbandry at Ripley's has suggested during a press release that orange lobsters might just have multiplied in numbers, unbeknown to scientists and aquatic life researchers, which might be the reason behind the quick appearances. “Orange lobsters are uncommon but perhaps not as rare as we first thought,” Durrett said, also confirming that 'Biscuit and Cheddar' had been rescued.
“Lobsters obtain their color through the pigments they ingest in their diet. If these orange lobsters are being harvested from the same region, perhaps their localized diet contains a pigment that, when paired with the lobster’s genetics, creates the orange coloration we are seeing,” Durrett stated, explaining the situation. Nicole Bott, a spokesperson from Red Lobster, shared how orange lobsters have been showing up more often, especially around this time of the year. Ripley houses another pair of orange lobsters that were discovered in a grocery store in fall of 2021.
